#eeking

Make Art was made as an Independent Study project this past semester (Fall 2022). I wanted to try out a longer-term project since all of the prototypes I'd worked on up until this point were 1-5 weeks.

Over the summer, I came up with three different ideas I could spend the semester: a 2D game, a tabletop game, and a 3D game. Obviously, I settled on the first idea. In retrospect, I'm really glad I chose to work on Make Art -- I've learned a lot by making this game that I wouldn't have otherwise.

It was slow but exciting progress over the course of the semester -- first getting a drawing system working, then implementing the AI, working out the layering, and then getting the AI to draw curves.

Throughout all of this, my goals for the game changed a lot. I started this project back in August (or even October 2021, if you want to go by the first version of the prototype), and the situation surrounding AI art has changed a lot between then and now. And my thoughts about this project have also undergone a lot of changes as a result.

At the start, the game was going to be more dark. You teach this AI to draw as a means of teaching it about abstract emotion -- and over the course of the game, it works to mimic you until it can create near-perfect forgeries.

Because of what I was seeing in the world around me (aaaand because of technical limitations), that didn't end up happening. Instead, Make Art is much more comedic and friendly. The AI, Marcel, is no longer the player's student -- he's their friend. You just play these little drawing games together with no regard for technical skill or artistic merit.

(Left: my drawing of a bird. Right: Marcel's drawing of a bird.)

It was a bit of a limp to the finish line with this project, finals season was tough this semester. I didn't quite have the time to finish up everything I wanted to, so I decided to get that done now!

All in all, this was a really valuable project to get to work on before I start thesis work next fall and I'm happy with how it turned out :-)